Zinc dust: An extremely active and reusable catalyst in acylation of phenols, thiophenol, amines and alcohols in a solvent-free system

A trace amount of zinc dust is able to promote instantaneous quantitative acylation of a large variety of functionalized phenols, thiophenol, amines and alcohols with acyl chlorides under solvent-free condition at 25 °C. The catalyst can be recovered and recycled making the procedure potentially useful for industrial applications.